Alessandro Innocenti

The backlash effect

Back in December, journalists were surprised when President Obama called exclusively on female reporters during a press conference. The president is not the only one explicitly focusing on getting women to have more of a say. Google’s technical employees recently found this message in their inbox: “I wanted to update everyone on our efforts to encourage women to self-nominate for promotion… We know that small biases—about ourselves and others—add up over time and overcoming them takes a conscious effort.” What is this about? Can women not speak up for themselves? ….[READ]